


At least it can’t get any worse

by debwalsh



Series: Deb’s Fictober Surprise! [28]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types
Genre: Bucky Barnes's Metal Arm, First Kiss, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Mutual Pining, inappropriate boners
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-31
Updated: 2018-10-31
Packaged: 2019-08-11 12:39:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16475735
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/debwalsh/pseuds/debwalsh
Summary: An inopportune moment in the showers after a mission leads to ... well, some might think it’s an opportunity ...





	At least it can’t get any worse

**Author's Note:**

> I am determined to complete this challenge today. And i’ve actually now written over 50K works of Steve and Bucky goodness this month.
> 
> I woke up thinking about this one. And I really quite like it.

“Ugh! God-fucking-damn!”

Steve heard Bucky’s curses as he came into the shower area after stripping down and stowing his gear. Buck had been on the other Quinjet, so he hadn’t had a chance to debrief with him since they were both picked up.

“What’s’a’matter, Barnes? Get GSR in your hair again?” he joked as he rounded the wall separating the shower area from the locker room.

And. Wow.

Steve’d seen Bucky naked lots of times. Sure. And every one of them he’d pushed down the interest he’d felt in favor of preserving a lifelong friendship.  

But. Oh.

Bucky wasn’t just naked. No. He was naked, and wet and doing something with his metal arm that made him jerk back and forth, setting that, yeah, wow and double wow, big damn cock of his swinging like he was practicing for the majors.

Steve felt the overwhelming urge to drop to his knees and -

“Yo, Rogers! If you’re done appreciatin’ my clearly superior manhood, how about a hand over here, huh?”

Steve shook himself, blushing fiercely. The chub in his nether regions was unmistakeable, and Bucky arched an eyebrow at him. “Seriously, pal? This is what does it for you, punk?” he asked, swiveling his hips to set everything in motion again. 

Steve scoffed. “What? No. Post mission adrenalin, jerk. Now, what’s your problem?”

“Gunk in the mechanism. I can’t get to it, and it’s starting to seize up,” he answered, waggling the metal arm like a baby bird’s wing. It was stiff and it looked like his range of motion was really curtailed.

“Well, maybe you should have Tony take a look at it,” Steve said doubtfully.

“Maybe you should get your patriotic ass over here and see what you can do.”

Swallowing down a retort - not to mention his all too real arousal - Steve stalked over with his best Captain America parade stance, then moved around so he was standing behind Buck, out of sight of his “package.” So, instead, he had a perfect view of his perfect ass, just inches from his very interested Johnson. Oh, this was not going to end well for him.  

He turned his frowning attention to the prosthetic, and that’s when he saw it - green goop oozing between the plates, starting to become opaque on the edges and in spots, hardening before his eyes.

All thoughts of arousal went out of his head. “Buck, how’d you get this?”

“One of them aliens spewed it at me before I blew its head off. I wiped it down in the Quinjet, and it seemed fine, but now -“

Steve scooped some of it out of one of the joints and held his fingers under the spray. The goop immediately hardened, and he had to use his other hand to pry it off.

“It’s activated in water you idiot. C’mon, let’s go back to the locker room and get you dried off, and I’ll see if I can get it out of the plates.”

Bucky nodded as the shower turned itself off. “Thanks, J,” he said.

JARVIS responded, “Would you like me to alert Sir, Sergeant Barnes?”

“No, let’s see if Steve can get it out. If he can’t I’ll swing by to see Bruce.”

“As you wish.”

&&&

They both grabbed towels to wrap around their hips, Steve’s earlier arousal and embarrassment forgotten as he focused instead on the mission - figuring out just what was going on with Bucky’s arm and the green gunk.

“So this is alien what - blood? Puke?”

“Slime? I dunno. I was covered in it, got most of it off on the Quinjet, but it had already gotten between the plates. Figured a hot shower would take care of it.”

“Yeah, little did you know.”  

They dropped down onto one of the long benches, Bucky straddling the bench while Steve rode it side saddle so he was up close and personal with Bucky’s shoulder and arm. His breath ghosted hot and immediate across Bucky’s neck and the gnarled flesh of what was left of his shoulder. He shuddered at the sensation as Steve gently pulled his hair back from the skin.

“Sorry, does that hurt?” Steve asked, all innocent concern.

“Yeah, no. Just hitting me now, I guess - alien something inside my arm. On me. It’s creepy.”

“Yeah, I can only imagine. Well, let’s see what we can see,” Steve murmured, his fingers probing along the plates. “Huh, it looks like it’s not sticking in its solid form.” Bucky felt a slight change in pressure along one of the plates in the upper shoulder, and then Steve held out a misshapen hunk of green in his palm for Bucky to see.

Relief flooded through Bucky then. Until he felt Steve’s big, warm hands moving along the edge of the prosthetic, thumbs pressing into the muscle as he worked the gunk free from the cap of his shoulder. It was all Bucky could do not to moan.

Steve wasn’t the only one to have to worry about inappropriate boners.

And just why did Steve get a boner? Bucky suddenly thought. It wasn’t because he -

“Huh. Now it’s drying out, it looks like it’s softening up again. Stay here, I’m gonna get some more water and some Q-tips. Pair of forceps, too.”

“Yeah, sure. I got no place to be,” he said jovially as Steve went in search of the tools he needed. “Nobody I’d like to be doing,” he added under his breath, low enough he knew that even super soldier hearing couldn’t pick it up. Hell, he could barely hear himself.

He felt Steve drop back onto the bench, felt him scoot closer, and instead of miles of skin like he was expecting (praying for), he felt the rough brush of denim against his naked leg.

“You get dressed, punk?”

“Figured one of us might as well be. Now shaddup, I gotta concentrate. Hold this,” Steve chuckled, shoving a metal specimen pan into Bucky’s hand, and he went to work.

Chunk after chunk of the stuff pinged in the metal pan as Steve moistened and extricated it, huffing and humming as he went along. The heat rolling off his body was making Bucky dizzy, and it was all he could do not to let his head fall back onto Steve’s shoulder, turn his head just so, and kiss the fucker. But, oh how he wanted to.

Finally, Steve’d cleared everything in the back and on the side, and now he needed to address the stuff wedged in the cracks at the front of the arm. He stood up and came around to Bucky’s front, frowning awkwardly. “Um ...”

“Wanna sit in my lap, little boy?” Bucky smirked, putting more honest flirt into it than he’d intended.

“Um ...”

Oh. Oh fuck. Now he’d broken Steve. Those gorgeous blue eyes were wide and terrified, pupils dilated to blackness as the blue disappeared, and oh. Oh, hello! That bulge was definitely more prominent than it had been a moment ago.

So. Question of the century. Well, this and the last century. Make like it’s a joke and preserve the peace - and the friendship? Or finally go for it, and risk it all? But oh, the rewards if he was reading this situation correctly.

The eclipsing dark of Steve’s eyes, the parted lips, and the peek of pink tongue sliding across his lower lip did it for Bucky. Well, Steve always did it for Bucky, but this time, he was done in.

He launched himself up so they were standing face to face, and he took a step forward, ignoring how his towel no longer hid the woody that had come out to say hi. “Or I can sit in yours. I can go either way,” he added, letting a little sultry swagger slide into his movements. He telegraphed his intent as he reached out his hand to take the implements out of Steve’s hands, set them gently on the bench, and stepped closer.

“Tell me to stop,” he murmured, eyes fixed on Steve’s lips. “Tell me to stop and I will. Tell me I’m reading this wrong.”

“Don’t. Don’t stop,” Steve breathed, and yeah, Bucky could hear how that breath caught, how Steve’s heart was racing. “And no. No, you’re not reading this wrong. Am I? Is this really happening?”

“Yeah, doll. You are. I’m gonna kiss you now, okay? I’ve been wanting to do this since 1932. Think it’s about due, huh?” he said, lifting his left arm to cradle Steve’s face as he slid his right hand around the soft hairs at Steve’s nape.

Only the left hand never made it to Steve’s face.

It got stuck, halfway up, a squishy kind of crunch as the alien gunk wedged in tighter.

“Oh, fuck.”

Steve started to laugh, a full-bodied, up from his toes laugh, his left hand slapping against his pec and his head thrown back laugh. Bucky would’ve been charmed if he wasn’t already flailing.

“Laugh it up fucker. Way to kill the mood. Goddammit!”

Steve stopped laughing, and leaned in closer, brushing his lips across Bucky’s. He dropped his hands - those big, warm, paws that Bucky dreamed about - on Bucky’s naked hips, and tugged him closer, deepening the kiss. Bucky literally moaned into it, weakling that he was. Then Steve pulled his lips away from Bucky’s - crime of the century! - and dropped a kiss on the crown of Bucky’s metal shoulder. “Lemme take a look - probably just got some alien crap wedged in there. I’ll have it cleaned out in a jiff. At least it can’t get any worse.”

Bucky stared at Steve in wonder, a slow, delighted smile spreading across his face. He could feel it stretch his mouth, plump up his cheeks, and warm his face. “No, It can’t get any worse. It’s gonna be a whole lot better,” he said softly, earning him the sweetest smile he’d ever seen on Steve Rogers’s face.

“I know. Me, too,” Steve answered, and went to work cleaning out the rest of the ick from Bucky’s arm. Only now he paused every so often to plant a kiss on Bucky’s waiting lips, the rising heat in his eyes a promise Bucky couldn’t wait to collect.

END

**Author's Note:**

> On the home stretch! Only two more installments. And I think you’re gonna like ‘em.


End file.
